Devotion 13 - Identity & Destiny
Eph.1:5 – “In love He predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ.”
A baby eagle unfortunately fell out of its nest near to a chicken coop and became separated from its family. A compassionate mother hen took pity on the apparently orphaned eagle and raised the baby eagle as her own.
As it grew, the young eagle pecked and shuffled along the ground along with its chicken siblings, having never learned that life could be any different. One day it looked up at an eagle soaring high in the sky and marvelled “Wow, how I wish I could soar like the eagle”
This is a classic example of a Christian with an orphan mindset. We are created to be ‘an eagle’ but live with an identity of a ‘chicken’. Disconnected from our true identity, this orphan mindset hinders us from fulfilling our destiny in Christ. Until we do, we will live like the young eagle in the story, believing that we are subject to limitations that do not exist. We will never fulfil our potential or live a supernatural Christian life as long as we live with such a mindset. We need to fully comprehend the Family that we belong to.
We can pay mental assent to the truth of our acceptance as a child of our Heavenly Father and yet our feelings and responses sometimes reveal a deep-set belief that God has left us to live life alone and apart from Him. We call God our Father yet live with a ‘fatherless’ mindset.
Strongholds of an Orphan Mindset
2 Cor.10:4 – “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds…”
Like any ‘strongholds’ in our minds, the orphan mindset needs to be recognised, torn down and replaced with the truth of God’s Word. So how do we recognise and deal with an orphan mindset?
- We have an orphan mindset when we are always worrying, plagued by anxiety, constantly feeling fearful and inadequate to walk in obedience to Jesus.
Jn.14:16-18 – “And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever - the Spirit of truth…He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you…”
An important aspect of maturing into having a sonship mindset is to grow in our relationship with the Holy Spirit who lives in us. We will never be or do what Father has called us to do without the presence and enabling power of the Holy Spirit. We need to build into our mindset the reality of the Holy Spirit in our life and consider not our inability but His ability for every moment and challenge, both present and future.
- We have an orphan mindset when we believe that it is impossible to live up to the standard set by Jesus.
Like the young eagle gazing at the eagle soaring in the sky, we look at the life of Jesus presented in the Gospels and wonder, can we soar like Him…
Eph.4:11-14 – “And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints…till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ…”
Rom.8:29 – “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.”
As children of God, we are created in His image and share in His family likeness—His DNA. The same Holy Spirit that anointed Jesus also lives in us. We have the potential to grow into the same measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. We are predestined to be conformed to His image. However, an orphan mindset will cause us to be His followers in name only; but at the core of our hearts, we don’t actually believe that we are be able to walk like Jesus did while on this earth and ultimately fulfil our destiny and mission on this earth.
Our Perspective Impacts our Destiny
In my house, I have a picture of the world map on the wall. Since 1998, we felt God has given us a call to the nations to restore and strengthen marriages and families. Looking at the map, I often wonder, can we really fulfil this mission given the limited resources from our monthly supporters.
One day, in my contemplative prayer, I just felt the Holy Spirit impress this verse from the Scripture to my mind:
Ps.24:1 – “The earth is the Lord’s, and all its fullness, the world and those who dwell therein.”
Suddenly, I had a complete paradigm shift. It was no longer how much resources we have that would determine how many nations we can reach, but how far and how many nations our Father is sending us to. All we need is to ask, seek and walk in His will and we will never lack resources.
Put the Father in the picture, and our whole perspective changes. When we recognise our identity as sons and daughters of our heavenly Father, we view life differently. As a result, we will speak, think and act differently. We will not have a limited mindset like the young eagle living under a ‘false’ identity, but instead, we will just flap our wings and soar high into our destiny.